Case Study | Estadão

News portal Estadão employs the unique features of Google+ to deepen engagement, stimulate interaction and drive visitors to their site Background

About Estadão

● Portal for O Estado de S. Paulo newspaper ● Launched in 2000 ● Headquartered in São Paulo, Brazil

Founded in 1875, O Estado de São Paulo is one of Brazil’s most influential newspapers. In order to provide information in real time, the paper launched the portal Estadão.com.br in March 2000. Today the site maintains a leadership position in online journalism in Brazil, focusing on an analytical approach to news, politics, economics and international events. The audience is quite broad, although in general the site tends to attract people who want neutral, reliable, analytical information, are interested in major issues of society and who see the news as an instrument of social transformation. Estadão has a dedicated team that handles its various social media accounts, and editors across the organisation who maintain and manage their own accounts too. Social media is a growing priority, so constant training is offered to keep the staff up to date on best practices, new technologies and useful features.

Google+ gets the conversation started

Estadão launched its Google+ activity in the second half of 2011, and discovered it offered a slightly different opportunity from other social media channels already in use. “Initially we started using Google+ to test the network and understand its functionality,” explains Digital Content Director Claudia Belfort. “Soon I realized that the comments on Google+ were more elaborate. Our followers are very interested in contributing to a discussion so we decided to invest more, always with this focus.”

“Users seem interested in a network that is not only social, but also enables the sharing of intelligence.” - Claudia Belfort, Digital Content Director, Estadão.com.br

Over time, Estadão has built the unique ability of Google+ to stimulate conversation and discussion into the content strategy. “We found that our users are interested in a network that is not only social, but also enables the sharing of intelligence,” Claudia explains. “We now publish content relevant to them. The Google+ network responds well to serious themes; these draw attention. Today, we publish news focused on topics like economics, politics and current affairs, often with a more informal tone, which appears to mobilize this network.

Claudia is careful to tailor the content strategy and posts to the Google+ readership rather than replicating the same content across all of the social media outlets that Estadão uses. “There is an overlap of our readers in Google+ and Facebook,” she says by way of example. “But they have different profiles, so I’ve tried to develop specific activity for each of these groups, without giving up the character of our news.”

Photos, videos and hangouts deepen engagement

It’s not only the exchange of ideas through the written word that Google+ facilitates, though. Estadão has wisely made the most of the inherently visual nature of the platform by posting full images, captivating video content and stimulating face-to-face discussion through hangouts, the free, high-quality video chat feature of Google+.

“We have frequently held hangouts,” Claudia affirms. “In the area of ​​ economics, for example, we can be very active in this new functionality. Now, I’m deepening our presence on Google+ in order to stimulate more engagement. It is important that our communication channels enable community participation. In this sense, I see a great opportunity with Google+. I’m already starting unique initiatives on this network.” Claudia has designed training in hangouts and video for the Estadão staff to encourage uptake, and already plenty of creative initiatives are underway. “We have launched the TV Estadão, which is a daily economic analysis video; on our social networks this will be unique to Google+,” she says. “We will put a podcast with a summary of the main news of the day, always at night, around 10pm, and every Friday we’re featuring a trailer with a hint of cinema for the weekend.”

Measuring the results and reaping the benefits About Google+

Linking your site to your page unifies your +1’s across search, your Google+ page and your homepage. Google+ pages let you share your content with new audiences and connect with them in more engaging ways. To learn more about Google+ pages, visit www.google.com/+/business

So how does Estadão measure social media success? “Initially, numbers of followers,” says Claudia. “I still think this is important, but now I measure the reach of our content as a more effective way to analyze results. If distribution is necessary for there to be a mass of followers, this mass must have important news and analysis to share.” Estadão uses Google Analytics to understand visitor behavior, and it’s clear that Google+ is having a positive effect on traffic to the portal. Over a fivemonth period, Analytics revealed that visitors to the Estadão site from the Google+ page increased 540%. At the same time, this traffic generated an uplift in page views per visit of 18%. As the Estadão Google+ page continues to grow beyond its current 511,000 followers, benefits to the business as a whole like these are on course to continue. 2012 Google inc. All rights reserved. Google and the Google logo are trademark of Google Inc. All other company and product names may be trademark of the respective companies with which they are associated.